


On the Train

by highfunctioningsarcastic



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Canon Backstory, Developing Friendships, Friendship, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-11
Updated: 2019-10-11
Packaged: 2020-12-09 04:40:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 465
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20988998
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/highfunctioningsarcastic/pseuds/highfunctioningsarcastic
Summary: The story of how four boys named Remus, Peter, James, and Sirius met on the train on the way to Hogwarts.





	On the Train

Contrary to what they would all claim later, James, Peter, Remus, and Sirius met on the train.

Remus came to King’s Cross early, because his parents worried that they’d never convince him to go if they waited until the last minute. The Lupins purchased pastries from a nearby shop for their breakfast, walked to the station, and spent the morning reminding Remus of McGonagall telling him that nothing else mattered but for the fact that he had magic in his veins, and magic in his veins meant that he belonged at the school. Never mind his monthly problem.

Peter came exactly on schedule, Side-Along Apparating to a conveniently obscure place on the Underground at 10:45 because his parents had done this beginning of beginnings twice already, with his brother starting the fifth year and his sister who’d finished her seventh year. He waved goodbye to his parents as his brother warned him that Peter had better not expect to sit together. He lugged his trunk to the closest empty compartment he could find and sat down to wait.

James arrived by the time you could hear the train's whistle blow for the first time, the cabbie’s Muggle curses ringing in their ears. James was an only child to older parents, and getting what he wanted meant sweets for breakfast and a Muggle cab to the station. They'd nearly been late and he'd tried to pay the cabbie in Galleons. He hugged his parents goodbye far shorter than they wanted, longer than he did, and ran headlong towards the train into a boy waving to his younger brother and fierce-looking mother.

Sirius was convinced that they were going to be late, what with Regulus fussing about not getting to go and his mother insisting that as they couldn’t Apparate in plain view of Muggles, they’d walk. After convincing his mother the Slytherin scarf she’d bought him would just stand out, he left it in his pocket all the rest of the day. He took the barrier at a run with his cart, hugged Regulus goodbye just long enough to mean it, and was barrelled into by a boy whose glasses smashed on impact.

So James and Sirius met just before they boarded the train. They quarreled about whose fault the collision was all the way to the first sort-of empty compartment--James had run into Sirius, but if _Sirius hadn’t been standing there_\--and, finding they were friends, boisterously introduced each other to the mousy-haired boy cowering behind his book.

“I’m Peter,” the boy said. “Peter Pettigrew. Nice to meet both of you.” The compartment door slid open again, and another boy, taller than the others, looked in.

“May I sit with you?” He inquired quietly, almost tiredly. “My name’s Remus...Everywhere else is full.”

**Author's Note:**

> I'm considering trying to embark on an all-seven-years epic for which this would be the first scene. Let me know what you think, if it's worth it, and I may be showing some more of the story soon.


End file.
